University of Tasmania urged to scrap Hobart city relocation and sell off CBD property portfolio

A founding member of the Save UTAS group has called on the university to formally abandon its city move, after it announced the sale of two inner-city hotels purchased five years ago.

An artist's impression of the Engineering and Technology buildings, and public space, proposed for the former K&D site by the University of Tasmania. Picture: Supplied

A founding member of the Save UTAS group has called on the university to formally abandon its planned move to the Hobart CBD, after the institution this week announced the sale of two inner-city hotels it purchased five years ago.

The call from long-time relocation critic and now Hobart councillor, Ben Lohberger, comes amid reports the university’s law school will no longer be moving from its Sandy Bay location into the refurbished old Forestry Building on Melville St.

In an email to UTAS staff on Monday, Deputy Vice-Chancellor Craig Barling said the hotel sell-off decision was motivated by forecasts that indicated overseas student numbers to Tasmania would never return to their pre-Covid highs.

The University of Tasmania purchased the old K&D Warehouse site in Hobart for $30 million in 2019. Picture: NIKKI DAVIS-JONES

But Mr Lohberger suggested the upcoming sales were as much to do with alleviating the university’s cashflow challenges, and urged UTAS to now reconsider its move to the city and the associated redevelopment of the Sandy Bay campus.

“My understanding is that they are struggling for funding at the moment, and I think it’s high time that the university mediated with staff, students, and the community about the best use of that [Sandy Bay] campus,” Mr Lohberger told the Mercury.

“At the moment they appear to be half-pregnant on the move, and it’s not a sustainable situation that we are in.

“The hotel decision is an indictment of the university’s planning, which has been all over the place on this move.

“The university needs to be a little bit nimble here and actually change its plans … and look at what the future use of the Sandy Bay site is.”

The university purchased the Mid City hotel in 2018 for $23.5m, and the Fountainside hotel a year later for $18.76m.

The state government has leased Fountainside since early 2020, initially as part of the state’s Covid response, while Mid City was leased to Vision Hotels in late 2021 and operates as a commercial hotel.

The University of Tasmania's Fountainside hotel building in Hobart will go under the hammer.

SaveUTAS co-chair, Mike Foster, said he hoped the university’s hotel decision represented a “U-turn” on its relocation plans, and urged management to place its other CBD assets such as the 1.3 hectare, $30 million K&D hardware site back on the market.

Mr Foster, who on Wednesday joined a roundtable discussion on the city move with union representatives, students leaders, and UTAS Pro Vice-Chancellor Professor Nicholas Farrelly at a meeting hosted by Hobart Lord Mayor Anna Reynolds, said he supported the hotel sales if they resulted in a return to a focus on students, teaching, and research at the university.

“But you can’t be sure … because even though it’s a major public institution, it’s a law unto itself and has no obligation to disclose its decision-making or what it’s up to,” Mr Foster said.

“And at the same time it sells the hotels, it is wasting $130 million on a small building in the Melville St to house the business and law schools, but which neither of those faculties want.”

UTAS did not provide a definitive response to questions about whether the Law School would now move to Melville St, only saying it would “follow a rigorous process ahead of the transition to Forestry to ensure locations and new spaces work for our students and staff”.

The university was equally coy on exactly which buildings in its multi-site CBD proposal would eventually be constructed, suggesting new sources of funding would now be required for the projects to be realised.   

The K&D Warehouse site is currently home to the Swisherr Hoops Academy. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

“In addition to the 40 per cent of the University already in the Hobart CBD, work to restore the Philip Smith Building on the Domain was recently completed and the Forestry building on

Melville Street is on track to welcome staff and students in 2026,” Mr Barling told the Mercury.

“Education in science, technology, engineering and mathematics is critical to the future of

Tasmania. 

“This will require high-quality, contemporary STEM facilities which can only be delivered with significant investment and a co-ordinated approach across all levels of government as it has been in Launceston and Burnie.”

Originally published as University of Tasmania urged to scrap Hobart city relocation and sell off CBD property portfolio